Creative Habitat

Art doesn’t just spontaneously appear; it’s the product of long hours and hard work. The public will get a chance to see art finished and in progress at the annual MFA (Master of Fine Arts) Open Studios tour Friday, Nov. 4, from 5 p.m. on at Harder Stadium at UC Santa Barbara. The event is free and open to the public.

Hosted by the UCSB’s art department, Open Studios showcases the work of 13 artists in the MFA program.

“Open Studios at Harder Stadium provides an excellent opportunity for the general public and the campus community to meet the art department’s MFA students on their home turf and see artworks in progress as well as the final product,” said Colin Gardner, chair of the art department and a professor of critical theory and integrative studies. “This gives visitors a unique insight into the working process, to see how works might come together from a ragbag of found materials and ideas or are carefully pre-planned from sketches and maquettes.

“It also demonstrates,” he continued, “the innate interdisciplinarity of the art program, both in terms of media — painting and drawing, sculpture/3D, ceramics, video, performance, print and book arts — but also its interdepartmental range. The students’ research intersects with identity politics and anthropology (urban and rural), marine biology, ecology, issues of space/place and community, social justice, the new materiality of labor and craft as well as the import of new technologies.”

The participating student artists for Open Studios are: Rose Briccetti, Marcos Christodoulou, Yumiko Glover, Lucy Holtsnider, Robert Huerta, Daria Izad, Jennifer Lugris, Jimmy Miracle, Carlos Ochoa, Sunny Samuel, Toni Scott, Peter Sowinski and Scotty Wagner.

Harder Stadium is located on Stadium Road on the UCSB campus. To find the event, enter the stadium at ground level, through the side door just past the gates.

The MFA graduate program at UCSB is an intense two-year course of study emphasizing interdisciplinary approaches to making art. Students may choose to concentrate on work in the areas of painting, drawing, photography, print, digital media and electronics, visualization, sculpture and new forms, theory and criticism, or develop their own multidisciplinary course of study. The program includes formal studio courses, graduate seminars in theory and criticism, studio critique and independent study. The program focuses on the personal growth of students in their pursuit of careers as dedicated, professional artists.